What is Open Source Web Marketing?

Open Source Web Marketing is the interpretation and implementation of “Open Source” Web-based technologies as marketing tools for businesses.

* We are primarily a marketing and management company.
* We are secondarily a client communications company.
* Our medium is the Web.
* We use Open Source Web-based Technologies.

What are Open Source Web-based Technologies?

“Open Source” is a movement toward access. In terms of Web developers, Open Source means access to free applications being built by a community of developers, and having access to the source code of these applications to do with them (development wise) as one would please.

Think about Microsoft Office. Think of what a wonderful and powerful software application it is and how many businesses have it integrated into their models. Think of QuickBooks and the amount of good it has done the small business. These are wonderful applications. But imagine if the general community of developers and entrepreneurs around the world was given access to the core code of these applications and were encouraged to innovate. Download them for free and change them in whatever creative way that you would like to. Then, if you come up with something you are proud of, submit it back to the core development team and they will upgrade the software to include your feature. The inspiring flood of innovation from this is undeniable; the question is about making money.

The argument of public space and proprietary ownership is one that will increasingly dominate our horizon – from the marketplace to court systems to the home.

We here at RevenFlo believe that the Open Source model is good for business. We believe in the innovative, creative, inspired evolution of business models as much as we do in technologies. Look at us. Finding ways to create profitability by serving is what any business model is. Serving people and businesses in their use of Open Source technologies is no different.

Think about this in terms of your website. We can download a prefabricated system (a content management system or a client management system) then we can continue to build on it, to customize it, to evolve it to fit your brand and business model.

Until recently you had two options: you could purchase software or build it from scratch. Purchased software is expensive and closed to core access. Building something from scratch of comparable power and elegance would take an investment of dozens to hundreds of thousands of dollars. Using Open Source is free, and it’s completely open (the source code) for developing any look, feel, or functionality that we desire to achieve.

The software is free and open because it has been released under a license approved under the Open Source Definition.

Though there are collaboratives forming, these tools are generally each built by a unique group of core developers. This team starts and manages the project as it is contributed to by developers from all over the world.

The incentives for these developers may vary from project to project from person to person, but they may generally include:

* Vitae credits
* Passion about the technology
* Professional achievement in the social-professional world
* A sense of academic contribution

Open-Source is an academia of sorts, but with a different and unique personality. (Read a post on Open Source at RevenBlog)
What Does this Mean to a Business?
Open-Source is a phenomenal gift to the small to mid-sized business. There is no more cost effective way to develop online systems that are truly integrated into your business – a website that really generates return, a client management system that not only accurately reflects your internal logistics but functions as the core, providing increased productivity and even inspiration through systemization.

But costs and customization are not the only benefits. Due to the sharing of access to developers across the world, the Open Source community persists to be prolific in launching new tools and innovations into the public space.

Options and innovations so abound on the internet that the most difficult part for a small to mid-sized business is to select and interpret these innovations as tools. Decision makers ask, “How can using these new Web technologies benefit my business, grow my market share, increase my revenue?”

This very question is why RevenFlo exists. We interpret the myriad innovations of the Web as tools for the small to mid-sized service business. Then we manage the building and integrating of these media and technologies (managing tasks like design, development, writing, and more).
What Must Decision Makers Understand?

Open Source Web Marketing is a new industry model built on the new Open Source model and pioneered by RevenFlo.

Three key factors to understand are these:

1. Open Source has a license that carries with it terms for compliance (see here). The most important aspect of this license for the business owner to understand is the nature of ownership. Ownership of the Open Source tool or system remains in the public space. That’s why it’s free for you and able to be customized in whatever way you like, but you can’t then turn around and sell it. (Of course, your not in the software development business anyway.)

2. RevenFlo uses third-party tools and Open Source technologies to build systems and media for you, exceptions may be a design or a strategy. Regardless, RevenFlo does not own anything that we deliver. We retain no rights, except the right to display or to not display the work in our portfolio. The deliverables are either owned by you (such as with designs or strategies) or they exist under the open source license (such as developed systems and technologies downloaded from the Open Source space).

3. RevenFlo is a ready staff that you pay by the hour. Thus, you are paying for our time and energy spent on your behalf.

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